Assessing the adaptability of the existing homes of older people

A rapidly growing number of older people wish to remain in their existing homes for as long as possible, in many cases leading to the need for adaptations. The extent of the adaptations required is influenced by the nature of the individual's impairments and by the design of their property. An approach to understanding the impact of the needs of older people on adaptation requirements based on the development of standard User Profiles and Mobility Profiles is presented together with an analysis of a varied set of 82 properties selected from across the UK.     

居民住宅的无障碍设计

欧洲社会正经历着变化。人均寿命比过去的半个世纪延长了10年。因为老龄人口在持续增长，所以需要离退人员公寓。由于大约97％的人们都期望呆在属于自己的家或环境中，所以社会上的大量需求是将现有住宅改造成新建筑,而新建筑要对这种需求加以考虑。建筑师与设计师们必须满足这些因社会人口学的发展而产生的需求变化。无障碍建筑在立法和标准中的确立象征了第一步，最终实现无障碍建筑还需要一个过程。     

Housed Gypsy Travellers,Social Segregation and the Reconstruction of Communities

This paper explores the ‘accommodation careers’ and social adaptations of Gypsies and Travellers living in ‘bricks and mortar’ accommodation and the implications of this trend for current concerns pertaining to social segregation and ‘parallel communities’. The paper discusses the ‘constrained choices’ regarding accommodation that Gypsies and Travellers face, before considering the structure of social relations in their respective localities. The strategies by which cultural identities are sustained in housing and how the presence of kin and other Gypsy/Travellers helps to mitigate some of the difficulties experienced are explored. However, the argument is made that while frequent social interaction and the maintenance of a distinct cultural identity provides a crucial source of support, there is also the danger that social relations become restricted to close ‘bonding’ networks, thus intensifying the social isolation of Gypsy/Traveller communities and further fragmenting neighbourhoods along ethnic lines.     

Functional recovery of a resilient hospital type

Four adaptation options for ‘Nightingale’-type hospital ward buildings devised with practising clinicians are presented and evaluated. The adaptations recover functionality in an archaic ward configuration by delivering care to current UK National Health Service (NHS) models whilst preserving resilience to summer overheating. The investigation builds on recent work that demonstrates the significant resilience to heatwaves enjoyed by such traditionally constructed communal dormitories, the dominant UK hospital type between the late 1850s and 1939. Nightingale wards are potentially well-ventilated naturally, with good dilution of airborne pathogens. Although condemned as outdated by health ministers in recent years, many remain in use. As financial retrenchment suggests economical, creative refurbishment of hospitals will be required rather than new-build and replacement, the authors argue for health estates’ strategies that place value on resilience in a changing climate. Proposed adaptation options are investigated to assess resulting internal airflows and patient exposure to airborne pathogens. Options are costed and payback periods calculated to the standard public sector methodology. The proposed adaptations save time and cost over new-build equivalents. Selection of the most appropriate option is dependent on the characteristics of the patient cohort and care required.     

Examining and quantifying the drivers behind alterations and extensions to commercial buildings in a central business district

The drive to undertake building adaptation has increased in momentum, the primary reason being adaptation can be less expensive than new build and conventionally result in faster project delivery times. The issue of sustainable development is another clear driver for adaptation and collectively buildings contribute around half of all greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time governments seek effective and efficient ways of reducing the contribution of cities to climate change and building adaptation appears to offer a practical means of reducing building-related emissions. One example is the ‘1200 building program’ which aims to increase adaptation rates with a target of 1200 city centre office adaptations by 2020 as part of the strategy to achieve carbon neutrality. Through a longitudinal examination of building adaptations it is possible to identify the nature and extent of typical levels of adaptation, as well as determining the inter-relationship between different types of adaptation and building attributes. Melbourne city centre was used for a case study which analysed 5290 building adaptation events between 1998 and 2008. The findings promote the adaptive reuse of buildings in specific circumstances and are directly applicable for increasing sustainability in the built environment. The case study focused on existing buildings in a global city to ensure relevance to urban centres where existing commercial buildings can become part of the solution to mitigate climate change.     

瑞士住宅的当今主题

个性化的需要 瑞士是一个以租用居所著称的国家。不到三分之一的人口有自己的房子。而在城市里，也只是一小部分人拥有自己的住宅。因而多层住宅形成了广泛的基础类住宅。很长时间以来一直如此。绝大多数出租公寓的主人都是个人。只有在有卫星城的大都市里，住宅协会，退休基金组织和在股票交易所上市的财团企业才有可能提供大量的住房。     

基于气候与功能双重适应的岭南建筑空间模式研究

文章立足于岭南建筑学派现实主义设计与技术研究的结合,将传统岭南建筑的气候适应性特征与当前新岭南建筑的实践相对照,从建筑空间和形体的层面去积极面对建筑节约型设计的诉求,采用空间塑造引导行为的建筑节能设计策略。选取典型的传统岭南建筑及当前岭南新建筑进行功能与气候双重适应的分析和评测,探寻既具有传统文化与地域性特征,又满足时代需求的建筑空间模式。并结合技术模拟手段来验证其可行性。     

物业消费的趋势探究

随着我国房地产市场的不断完善,物业管理已经成为新兴的重要行业,物业消费已成为人们生活的重要要素。本文从人们消费结构的重大变化催生出对物业管理的潜在需求、现代生活更加关注房地产物业的附加值、个人物业消费观念更新对物业管理提出挑战、物业行业已进入品牌时代、物业管理企业应解决高水平服务与低水平收费两难问题等五个方面,对物业消费的趋势进行研究,以推动物业管理企业提高管理服务水平。     

Home,sick: Implications of health care delivery in the home

Changes in technology as well as new policies concerning the public and private sectors have encouraged the growth of new activities in the home, including the care of people who previously would have been treated in a hospital. A good deal of interest in this issue has been generated in Sweden as of late, partly because of the promise of more humanitarian health care but also because of a hope that such reforms could lead to a reduction of public expenditures. The purpose of this article is to explore various consequences which may arise when schemes for health care in the home are implemented. The focus is on arrangements whereby patients are treated for a serious illness and spend their time recovering or receiving treatment in their own place of residence. Emphasis is placed on how being sick at home might affect the individual in question, how the position of other household members might be altered, and how relationships with health‐care workers might evolve. In each case, the article attempts to show the variety of ways ("positive” as well as “negative") in which the use and meaning of the home may be altered.     

The Provision of Furnished Accommodation by Local Authorities

Providing furnished accommodation is one of the means by which local authorities can provide a benefit to their residents in response to the government's attempts to limit social security expenditure. The provision of furniture can also be used to increase lettings in hard to let areas and to reduce the turnover of property. This paper describes the spread of furnished lettings among different authorities and considers in detail the introduction of part-furnished accommodation in Newcastle upon Tyne. The service provided in Newcastle is evaluated using the local authority's tenancy records and interviews with tenants. The results showed clear benefits to both the council and its tenants in providing furnished accommodation.     

Hospital learning from extreme weather events: using causal loop diagrams

Extreme weather events (EWEs) represent an important opportunity for hospital facilities managers to learn lessons to improve future hospital resilience. However, little is known about the process by which this occurs and how effectively this happens. These questions are addressed by an exploration of how individual hospital stakeholders learn about the performance of their facilities and share these lessons in the adaptation of future hospital disaster management plans. More specifically, the evidence of behavioural and social/collective learning is investigated amongst hospital stakeholders during EWEs. The data gathered from a case study of a major hospital network of four hospitals were qualitatively analysed within a constructionist ontology and interpretivist epistemology using causal loop diagrams (CLDs). This revealed how lessons were learned in the hospital network from collective stakeholder EWEs’ experiences. The findings highlight the need to develop appropriate processes and structures to capture, share and use facilities-related knowledge and embed new lessons learnt into future hospital disaster planning processes. Using Nonaka and Takeuchi's model of organizational knowledge creation, this paper presents new theoretical and practical insights for hospital facilities managers to build hospital resilience by better capturing the facilities-related lessons learnt in responding to an EWE.     

Domestic electricity use: A high-resolution energy demand model

The pattern of electricity use in an individual domestic dwelling is highly dependent upon the activities of the occupants and their associated use of electrical appliances. This paper presents a high-resolution model of domestic electricity use that is based upon a combination of patterns of active occupancy (i.e. when people are at home and awake), and daily activity profiles that characterise how people spend their time performing certain activities. One-min resolution synthetic electricity demand data is created through the simulation of appliance use; the model covers all major appliances commonly found in the domestic environment. In order to validate the model, electricity demand was recorded over the period of a year within 22 dwellings in the East Midlands, UK. A thorough quantitative comparison is made between the synthetic and measured data sets, showing them to have similar statistical characteristics. A freely downloadable example of the model is made available and may be configured to the particular requirements of users or incorporated into other models.     

Leaving home in the Netherlands: Timing and first housing

Successive birth cohorts have left the parentalhome at an accelerating pace in the earlypost-war decades in the Netherlands. A secondtrend, starting later but lasting longer, isthat people increasingly leave the parentalhome to live alone. Both trends have hadimplications for the housing market as theycontributed to the continuation of the housingshortage and generated a shift in the type ofaccommodation in which young adults start theirhousing career: an independent rented dwelling,shared accommodation, or home-ownership. Inthis contribution we set out to unravel boththe causes of the changing pattern ofhome-leaving between successive cohorts and therelation with the housing market entry insuccessive periods.The main hypothesis is that educationalexpansion was a major cause of the shift in themix of motives between cohorts, accounted forthe accelerating pace of home-leaving, and alsoaffected the type of housing market entry. Theempirical results support this hypothesis butalso show that the educational expansion doesnot provide a full explanation for eitherphenomenon. Union formation in particular isinvariably also determined by the employmentstatus of the male partner. Leaving home tolive alone, on the other hand, is lesssensitive to the individual income but isclearly stimulated by ample parental resources.In housing choice, the opportunity structureprovides an extra explanation. The wider accessto independent rental accommodation, forinstance, reduces the pent-up demand for sharedaccommodation that results from the educationalexpansion.     

Urban renewal partnerships—is there really room for participation from individual owners? A case study of Hong Kong

Public–private partnerships formed to carry out urban renewal activities are often criticized as property-led initiatives with little respect for the community and individuals concerned. Partnerships need participation from the partners, but in the course of participation, power politics emerge and evolve, leading to potential problems for the partnership governance structure. A more interesting issue is whether individual property owners at the renewal site can actually participate in this partnership and contribute to the renewal outcome. This paper shows that despite the call for more public/community involvement, most property owners are risk-averse. That is, when the monetary compensation meets their expectations, there is little incentive for them to participate, especially when the scheme is geared towards the investment profit of the scheme. The paper finds, based on a case study in Hong Kong, that individual owners tend to choose not to participate, with a view to maximizing their benefits. On the other hand, the request for further participation by owners never ceases. This leads to a demand for different forms of participation, such as the flat-for-flat model; the results are yet to be seen.     

The real estate bubble in Ireland. Policy context and responses

The impact of surges and corrections in residential property prices has been a feature of many international economies in the past two decades and was pronounced as the global financial crisis evolved from 2007 to 2015. Many European states such as Spain and Ireland were severely affected by market corrections, having experienced major property-development surges in the decade to 2007. Factors associated with such surges include a rapid growth in housing demand both for occupation and for investment purposes, often supported by relaxed credit and monetary policy stances. Many jurisdictions, including Ireland, also experienced supportive fiscal regimes, which artificially boosted investment in property acquisition and development, and ineffective planning and zoning regulatory systems for major growth centres leading to sprawl-type patterns of development. Irish residential property prices were at the top range of such international price increases and corrections, with major consequences for the general economy and the property market. This article explores the policy context which shaped the boom and bust and the policy response in place for market recovery.     

A socio-technical approach to post-occupancy evaluation: interactive adaptability in domestic retrofit

Understanding the process of domestic retrofit is important for learning and innovation. This is particularly the case for low carbon retrofits such as those undertaken under the UK's Retrofit for the Future (RftF) programme, with its aim to achieve an overall 80% carbon reduction by 2050. Current post-occupancy evaluation (POE) research has both theoretical and methodological limitations with implications for technical and behavioural research in the built environment. Drawing on relevant ideas and concepts from social practice theory and science and technology studies, principally prefiguration (constraints/enablement), black-boxing, heating and cooling practices, this paper demonstrates how the relationship between buildings and people could be reconceptualized as mutually constitutive and co-evolving through a process of ‘interactive adaptation’. The concept of ‘interactive adaptation’ is explored through a novel approach to integrating physical and social data collected from a sample of dwellings selected from the RftF programme. Analysis yields insights into the influences and pathways of interactive adaptation resulting from retrofit technology and practices. The implications of these insights for policy-makers, the research community and practitioners are discussed: end-use energy demand policy needs to be informed by a socio-technical approach.     

经济适用房政策存在的问题及对策

指出经济适用房政策的目标主要是为了扩大住房供给,调节房地产投资结构和扩大市场有效需求,通过对经济适用房政策存在问题的分析,对如何完善经济适用房政策,解决中低收入群体的住房问题提出了界定购房对象、政策补贴等建议.     

Work–life fit: identification of demand and resource typologies within a systems framework*

Work–life fit occurs when people have the resources required to meet demands such that role performance (both at work and in non-work life domains) is effective. Interviews were conducted with 59 construction workers based in Melbourne, Australia to explore how demands and resources were experienced. Using a systems framework, data were analysed using thematic analysis. Results identified two demand typologies associated with demand-to-demand interaction. Demands operating as ‘influencers’ have a major impact on the conditions of the interdependent demand, while demands operating as ‘creators’ generate a new demand and shape the conditions of that demand. One resource typology related to resource–demand interaction was identified. ‘Enabling resources’ enable an individual to manage multiple demands across multiple domains, and may also enable an individual to manage multiple demands within a single domain. A new conceptual contribution is made to an area in which theory is under-developed, by adopting a systems approach to understanding the dynamic interactions between demands and resources. A lack of fit is damaging for the individual; therefore, it is useful to know that demands and resources are interdependent and these interdependencies will vary according to individuals. Using a systems approach to understanding demands and resources will be helpful to organizations seeking to support workers to achieve optimal work–life fit.     

Development of a mercury‐free ultraviolet high‐pressure plasma discharge for disinfection

Ultraviolet (UV) disinfection is a critical and growing application for the disinfection of water. Current UV systems for disinfection applications are designed around the use of Low‐Pressure and High‐Pressure mercury‐based lamps. Increasing demand to reduce and ideally remove the use of mercury requires innovative adaptations and novel approaches to current technology. A potential alternative technology could be Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs), with current low efficiencies, high costs and low operating powers, a development gap for a high‐power mercury source has been identified. A mercury‐free tellurium‐based high‐pressure plasma was developed and assessed. Though relatively low efficiencies were measured compared to current mercury‐based technology rapid improvements are likely obtainable. Such an approach enables a novel adaptation to current technology utilising established: manufacturing facilities, approaches of UV system design and validation protocols. As a consequence, it offers the potential for a rapid low‐cost transition to mercury‐free UV disinfection where no alternative is currently available.     

Community-based adaptation through ecological design: lessons from Negril,Jamaica

This paper identifies the conceptual similarities between ecological designs and ecosystem-based adaptations to climate change. The former includes approaches grounded in expert knowledge, such as landscape ecological urbanism, while the latter is rooted in local experiential knowledge and relies on community-based adaptations. This paper bridges these expert and experiential knowledge forms through a transactive planning model by deploying design charrettes in the context of Negril, Jamaica. The findings reveal that local people are aware of ecosystems and prefer ecologically sensitive adaptation interventions. This study concludes with planning and design recommendations for climate change adaptation in Negril.